Abe Lincoln wanted to separate the races

The Great Emancipator was almost the Great Colonizer: Newly released documents show that to a greater degree than historians had previously known, President Lincoln laid the groundwork to ship freed slaves overseas to help prevent racial strife in the U.S.

Just after he issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, Lincoln authorized plans to pursue a freedmen’s settlement in present-day Belize and another in Guyana, both colonial possessions of Great Britain at the time, said Phillip W. Magness, one of the researchers who uncovered the new documents.

Historians have debated how seriously Lincoln took colonization efforts, but Mr. Magness said the story he uncovered, to be published next week in a book, “Colonization After Emancipation: Lincoln and the Movement for Black Resettlement,” shows the president didn’t just flirt with the idea, as historians had previously known, but that he personally pursued it for some time.

Also, King did have a criminal record, but so did many civil rights leaders. I don't see how that dulls what he preached or did. Given his circumstances, breaking the law mustve seemed necessary. I may have done the same.

The Roosevelt administration had been infiltrated by the Soviets. This isn't disputed. What isn't asked: did they simply leave or did they carry on? Now, McCarthy may not have been liked, but that does not make his efforts erroneous.

Also, King did have a criminal record, but so did many civil rights leaders. I don't see how that dulls what he preached or did. Given his circumstances, breaking the law mustve seemed necessary. I may have done the same.

Did many civil rights leaders indulge themselves in illegal or immoral activities that had nothing to do with any civil rights movement? Did they also present themselves as godly, righteous church people?

The Western nations were blighted with local Communist parties, almost all of whom reported to Moscow or soon did after funding was dangled. I can't indict McCarthy for being "paranoid" when he was right, and when the Soviets were so destructive we'll be undoing their environmental damages clear into the 2400s.

The Roosevelt administration had been infiltrated by the Soviets. This isn't disputed. What isn't asked: did they simply leave or did they carry on? Now, McCarthy may not have been liked, but that does not make his efforts erroneous.

Also, King did have a criminal record, but so did many civil rights leaders. I don't see how that dulls what he preached or did. Given his circumstances, breaking the law mustve seemed necessary. I may have done the same.

Did many civil rights leaders indulge themselves in illegal or immoral activities that had nothing to do with any civil rights movement? Did they also present themselves as godly, righteous church people?

First point - I'm not going to deny an increased sympathy towards communism in the 1940s and 1950s; it's when Marx was starting to get really big with some people based on the various communist regimes which existed around the world. If you don't want spies in your government, its good to weed them out, but McCarthy presented himself as an idiot. He called EVERYONE who opposed his views a communist. That sounds more like the rhetoric of a Fox News pundit than a serious government investigator. It did not behoove him to cry wolf whenever he thought he saw one; which is why he might has well have been wearing a tin foil hat through it all.

Second point - Yes. To both counts. Look at Al Sharpton (encouraged anti-Semitic riots), Frances WIllard (accused boose of being specifically the cause of crime in blacks, then had her mistress/lover in the UK silence Ida Wells, a black public speaker who would've outed her for the hypocrite she was), or Jesse Jackson (continually responsible for making anti-Semitic and Arab remarks, all the while preaching unity and peace).

Actually, now I've kind of depressed myself. But anyway, King was not a perfect person, and many civil rights leaders rarely are. They're people after all. When I discovered MLK's record of immoral activities while doing some research on him a while back, it was quite disillusioning; especially in regards to the many positive things he inspired. False idol worship, perhaps?

Either way, I don't think he should be put on the immortal pedestal he is on right now, but I do appreciate the good things he did and was able to inspire.

If you don't want spies in your government, its good to weed them out, but McCarthy presented himself as an idiot. He called EVERYONE who opposed his views a communist.

He may not have been 100% right, but he was right enough -- at a time when everyone else was in denial.

Keep in mind that at the time, Communists were executing not only dissidents but merely those accused once of being dissidents.

McCarthy wrecked lives and wasn't always right, but sometimes you need the bull in the china shop.

I don't mean to defend his general tactic, as my own are different, but I think he's not all bad either. The American Communists were clearly bad and of the people he accused, most were BOTH simply opposing his views and also Communist-sympathetic.

I never dug the Reagan-era crusade against Communists except the Cold War itself, because it seems to me people liking Communism is a type of something much baser... like how teenage rebellion can involve sex, drugs and Che Guevara, and yet be none of those things. Hard to describe. A worse threat than McCarthy is becoming unselfcritical and thinking that if it's NOT Communist, it MUST be right -- at least, I fear that more.

You hit on some good topics that I hope others will discuss in greater length, as well as looking forward to your continuing contributions.